The identification of classifiers and predictors of psychopathology that are based on brain functions has remained elusive due to limited insight into the neurobehavioural mechanisms underlying behavior. Here we present data from the longitudinal imaging genetics project IMAGEN of 2000 adolescents who have been assessed at age 14, 16 and 19 years (Schumann et al. Molecular Psychiatry 2010). Starting from a neuropsychosocial model of prediction of adolescent alcohol abuse (Whelan et al. Nature, 2014) we willdiscuss several published and unpublished neurobehavioural studies that discovered brain mechanisms underlying impulsiveness (Whelan et al Nature NS 2012), reward anticipation, the relation of gene expression and brain functional activity (Richiardi et al. Science 2015), as well as investigations measuring the effect of alcohol on brain development. We will present a model that allows integration of the different modalities investigated while maximizing correlation between biological mechanisms and observable behavior using sparse canonical correlation analysis. We propose that a combination of thorough neurobehavioural investigations with advanced statistical models will result in the development of robust multimodal biomarker profiles for clinical application.